


Duodecim

by songsofgallifrey



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Blood and Violence, F/M, James "Bucky" Barnes - Freeform, Minor Character Death, References to Depression, Suicidal Thoughts, Werewolf AU, Werewolf Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 01:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21245579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/songsofgallifrey/pseuds/songsofgallifrey
Summary: James Barnes went missing as a high school senior a decade ago and was presumed dead. Rumors of wolf attacks in the forests around the cabin that belonged to the Barnes family meant that no one had been up there since. But tonight is Halloween night, and a full moon, and the prospect of finding something - anything - pertaining to his disappearance is too powerful to resist. There are secrets in the woods. Are you ready to discover them?





	Duodecim

**Author's Note:**

> This, my longest solo one-shot, was written as part of a Halloween writing challenge hosted by stanclub on Tumblr. This is the first time I've ever written about werewolves, and it was a lot of fun! This is exactly what I needed to get my creativity flowing again after such a long slump. Thanks so much for reading, please feel free to let me know what you think if you liked it!
> 
> [In case you didn't see the tags, please note that there is a brief mention of depression and mild suicidal thoughts toward the end.]

The last streaks of gold and purple were fading from the evening light that filtered through the dense trees as you approached the second mile marker heading up the overgrown mountain trail. Your boots flattened the crunchy leaves and twigs with each step, squishing the stagnant, dirty water out from the mud beneath them that made you glad you weren’t wearing sandals like - 

As if on cue, you heard the loud snap of a twig and your best friend Heather swearing up a storm behind you. You loved her to death, but she had been about as helpful as a sack of rocks and made enough noise to scare everything off within a ten-block radius. You hadn’t wanted to take this trek alone, not knowing what you could find in these woods, or what could find you, so you had dragged her along. 

“Come on, I told you I don’t want to go any further, now let’s go home!” Heather huffed dramatically and swatted at her bare legs. You rolled your eyes at her over your shoulder - it wasn’t your fault she chose to wear shorts and flip flops to go hiking in late October. She gestured at a black and red smear on her leg. “I’m being eaten alive here, you know mosquitoes love me. I’m gonna get anemic or something.”

The air was heavy with moisture and the scent of rotting wood and leaves nearly suffocated you. Indeed, there were mosquitoes everywhere you looked, but for some reason they had never bothered you. Your breath was just barely visible in the chilly air, a signal of the cold night to come and a warning of what could happen if you strayed too far and got caught in the woods in the dark without being prepared. As far as anyone knew, no one had been in these woods since James Barnes disappeared without a trace a decade before. No one had dared. Rumors of people getting killed by rogue wolves made everyone keep their distance.

You hiked your backpack a little higher on your shoulders and stared ahead, trying to make out the shape of what looked like a cabin just a couple hundred feet away through the mist. This cabin once belonged to the Barnes family, and was exactly what you had hoped to find. 

_ Jackpot! _

“You’re just scared because it’s Halloween,” you teased. “I warned you to dress for a long walk. Just a little longer, I think I see something. We can go check it out and leave, I promise.”

Heather whined but she followed you up the trail. As the darkness began to set in, and the cold and fog with it, however, the cabin appeared to move farther and farther away the longer you walked toward it. The full moon was barely visible through the treetops, but it lent very little light to see by. The sound of an extra set of footsteps, too heavy to be animal in origin, made Heather clutch desperately at your elbow. She hadn’t brought a flashlight -  _ typical _ \- and was hovering within arm’s reach at every step. 

“Can we  _ please _ go home now? I don’t see anything. And I think something’s following us.” 

Heather’s voice was shrill with fear and you could feel her hand shaking. You looked back up the steep hill toward the last place you saw the cabin and frowned when you saw it was gone, replaced by the mist that always seemed to permeate this side of the mountain this time of year. You had to admit it was getting freakishly creepy. Maybe it was the atmosphere of the whole ordeal making your imagination run wild, but you could swear you kept seeing a shadow just at the edge of your vision.

But you didn’t want to leave empty-handed. The aspiring journalist in you was practically salivating at the prospect of finding remnants from the day James disappeared. You hadn’t known him personally, but everyone knew him as the cool guy with a surprising nerd streak. A senior in high school with a nearly immaculate GPA, James had had a bright future ahead of him, and when search efforts were canceled after weeks of no results and he was presumed dead, the entire town had mourned him. 

No, you couldn’t leave without finding  _ something. _

“Wait here,” you instructed Heather. “I’m going up to the cabin for just a minute and I swear we can go.”

Heather’s eyes got huge and she shook her head, curls bouncing around her terrified face. She clutched your hand as you turned away, refusing to let you go. Her hands were freezing cold and trembling. “No-no-no, don’t leave me here! I don’t see a cabin!”

You gave her your flashlight, a rather powerful camping light that helped cut through the fog, and dug in one of the outside pockets of your backpack for a head lamp. Once you had it on you managed to wrest yourself from Heather’s grip. It was getting darker every minute and you knew the longer you were up here in the dark, the more likely you would lose your nerve.

“I’ll just be a second, you’ll barely know I’m gone.” 

Your breath was shaking as you turned away from your friend and headed toward the cabin you  _ knew  _ you saw. One step at a time you made your way a bit farther up the trail, nearly tripping over a few gnarled roots along the way, trying to ignore the furious pounding of your heart. Painfully aware of every noise around you, you almost jumped out of your skin at the sound of a branch brushing against your backpack. At last, when you were about to call it off and come back another time, the mist cleared just enough for you to make out the cabin, a mere few yards away. 

The neglected building was not much larger than an RV and appeared to be so weakened by time and disrepair through the harsh seasons that if you pushed on the wall it would cave in. The windows had long since broken, and the untreated paint had worn off where it was not protected by the roof. Weeds snaked up the exposed wood and draped over the porch. All the evidence pointed to the fact that no one had been up here in a long time.

Except the front door was standing wide open.

As soon as you noticed this, the forest went dead. Not a single sound reached your ears - insects, owls, even the wind had stopped. The deafening silence set your heart at a breakneck speed, but you couldn’t move. An icy chill slid down your spine and settled in the pit of your stomach. Something was horribly wrong.

The light from your head lamp flickered and died, leaving you in total darkness. You hadn’t noticed that the light from the flashlight you had given Heather no longer reached you, so preoccupied you had been. Panicked, you tore off the lamp and hit it against your hand, begging it wordlessly to come back on. After a few attempts at this your fumbling fingers dropped the lamp and it bounced out of reach.

_ Heather! _

Her scream tore through you like a knife before you could get the word to come out of your mouth. Frozen in place, you couldn’t move your legs to run to her. Another tearful scream, this time your name, carried up the trail. The terror in Heather’s voice drove your feet to move, but after a few steps you tripped over  _ something  _ and landed sideways, there was a pain in the side of your head, and then everything went black.

\------------------------------------------

You awoke to the sound and warmth of a crackling fire, expecting to be at home and find out it was all a dream. The fog, the cabin, Heather; it all seemed too weird to be real. But the pain you felt trying to turn your head cleared the haze from your memory. Groaning weakly, you sat up as slow as you could. You weren’t dizzy, at least, so you suspected you didn’t have a concussion. Gingerly you raised your hand to see how bad the wound was, and you were surprised to feel a bandage there, with gauze wrapped around your head to keep it in place. 

“You really shouldn’t be out here.”

A strange male voice shot adrenaline into your veins and you were up and had ducked behind a couch before you realized what you were doing. You found yourself unable to form words for a good handful of seconds while you willed your heart to slow down before it gave out. 

“Sorry, ma’am, I didn’t mean to scare ya. I just couldn’t leave you out there in the cold with your head cut open like that. You okay?”

The man’s voice was calm and smooth, and it sounded familiar but you couldn’t place it. You took in what little of the room you could see from behind the couch to try to figure out where you were, but it wasn’t helpful since it was still dark outside and the only light came from the fire. Wooden walls, cracked windows, a musty smell like dirt and mildew.

“Who are you?” Your voice croaked a bit and you had to make yourself swallow to keep the panic out of your tone. “How long was I out?”

Footsteps, then the sound of a cup being placed on a table. “Not long, maybe three hours. Long enough to bandage you up and get the fire going.” You sat up and peeked out from behind the couch and saw the man poking at the fire with a stick. “You’re not far from where you were, this is my cabin and you fell right outside down that way.” He pointed his thumb towards the door and turned his head to look at you.

_ No. No fucking way. I must have hit my head harder than I thought.  _

Staring back at you with a gentle smile was a face you had seen dozens of times in the last ten years. Newspaper articles, posts on social media, even the local news had shown it. A face you saw every day your senior year of high school before it vanished forever.

Until now.

Your blood ran cold as you gazed at him, not believing your own eyes. How could James Barnes have vanished without a trace, only for you to stumble on him one random Halloween night, a decade later? No, it had to be his brother, or a cousin that looks like him or something. 

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” the man said, rising to his feet and sitting down on an old chair on the opposite side of the room. “You can leave when you want, your backpack is next to the door and I have a flashlight you can keep. But I wouldn’t recommend staying any longer than you have to.”

Finally you managed to stand up and sit on the very edge of the couch, a million questions on the tip of your tongue. The only one that found its way to your mouth was, “Why?”

“Well, for one thing, your friend ran off on her own and she wasn’t exactly dressed for a hike.” He chuckled briefly but stopped when he saw your likely stunned expression. You had completely forgotten about Heather. “There are things up here you’re better off not coming across, if you can catch my drift.”

“I’m not leaving yet. You never answered my first question,” you pointed out. “Who are you?”

He stared at you, his features settling into a neutral expression as he leaned into the fire light. “I think you already know the answer to that,” he said quietly, his hands coming together in his lap. 

You blinked, letting out an incredulous gasp. “You’re James -”

“Bucky.”

That caught you off guard. You had never heard him use a nickname when you were in school. “Bucky… Barnes?”

He looked at the fire, the light flickering across his face making him look older, harsher. “One and the same.” 

“Are you fucking with me right now? Because I’ve had a hell of a night and I need to get home.”

James - Bucky - laughed again, and the handsome face that graced your high school walls returned. It looked like he had barely aged at all, maybe a few laugh lines and a touch of gray in the scruff on his chin, but still almost just like the 18 year old you had known. The only marked difference was his eyes - this man had seen things he would live to regret.

Instead of answering you, Bucky rolled up the left sleeve of his flannel shirt. Sure enough, he still had the bright red star-shaped strawberry birth mark on his upper arm everyone knew about. Your stomach clenched, sending a wave of nausea through you. He was the real deal.

“I - how - why did you -?” Words escaped you, questions ricocheting around your brain like bullets until you realized you had been holding your breath. You forced yourself to take in air and let it out slowly. “What happened -”

“Believe it or not, I remember you,” Bucky interrupted. “You were in the journalism club. Did the school paper. You took my picture a few times.”

You nodded, speechless again.  _ Breathe in, breathe out.  _ You started to shiver despite the heat coming from the fireplace. 

“I’ll tell you what happened. But only because I know no one will believe it if you told them.”

_ Wait, what? _

Bucky rose from his chair and began to unbutton his shirt. You shook your head no over and over as you watched him remove his jeans and shoes, until he was down to nothing but his boxers. “You might want to cover your mouth so you don’t yell,” he warned you, slipping his boxers down his legs. “This will come as a surprise.”

In a movement almost too fast for you to perceive, Bucky leaped toward you over the table in the middle of the room. He transformed in midair and landed on all fours next to you as a massive gray wolf, blue eyes staring up at you expectantly. 

Stumbling over your feet with a scream, you ran for the door and threw it open. This was too much, too fast, it  _ can’t  _ be real. Without looking back you sprinted as fast as you could go, away from the cabin, trying to dodge the snarled roots and twisted branches that seemed determined to trip you up. Heart racing, another scream lodged in your throat, you managed to clear almost a hundred yards through the mist-shrouded trail before the body of another wolf blocked the path. 

Arms flailing, your boots skidded in the rocks and leaves and you landed on your back with the enormous wolf standing over you, hackles raised and teeth bared in a snarl. It wasn’t Bucky - this one was black as the night. You scrambled backward, trying to stand, but the wolf lunged forward the second you got to your feet and sank its teeth into your left leg with a savage growl. Pain seared through your body like fire and you cried out as you felt around for a way to escape its deadly grip. Your fingers found purchase in a thick tree root that was raised slightly out of the dirt and you pulled with all your strength, but your muscles were no match for a wolf’s. 

You were  _ not  _ going down without a fight.

You kicked the wolf as hard as you could with your right boot, square on its sensitive nose. It released your leg with a satisfying yelp, and you could just barely see blood trickling down its snout in the moonlight. But that only made it angrier. 

Time seemed to slow as the wolf reared back on its haunches and launched itself at you, turning its head to align its open maw with your vulnerable neck. The tables turned when a flash of gray fur soared over your body and intercepted the black wolf with a sickening thud as the pair hit the ground. Familiar blue eyes turned toward you, gleaming even in so little light.

_ Bucky! _

The fight didn’t last long. The black wolf struggled fiercely, but within seconds Bucky had his jaws locked around its neck, and with a twist of his head it turned lifeless and limp on the ground. 

Once you were sure Bucky’s opponent wasn’t breathing anymore, you tried to stand but the hot jolt of pain in your leg made it buckle underneath you. You swore so loud it echoed in the trees. You couldn’t see the bite, but when you put your trembling hand over the wound it came away wet and sticky even through your jeans. Cold, wet mud began to seep through the seat of your pants from sitting in it for so long. 

That was the final straw. 

Adrenaline spent, tears burned at your eyes as you buried your head in your dirty hands. This was all too much and you just wanted to go home, back to the life you had before you knew about Bucky, and werewolves, and insane lone wolves up on the mountain you should have avoided in the first place. Heather was probably going to hate you for taking her up here, if she made it out of the woods at all. And now you had a bite on your leg that could bleed you dry before help could arrive. 

A strong and nearly freezing gust of wind blew through the trees and it made you jump, but it helped to stop your downward spiral of panic. A furry snout nudged your shoulder and you wiped your nose on your sleeve before turning towards it. 

Bucky let out a little wolfish whine and gestured with his head for you to look at the dead wolf. You had to hold your hand over your mouth to keep from shouting in surprise at the sight of the now half-wolf-half-man. He had been a werewolf, then, not just an exceedingly murderous lone wolf. Facial features became more apparent with each second as his face transformed back into that of a human and the black fur fell off in large clumps. After about half a minute there was a naked and entirely human man lying dead in the dirt. 

“Wh… what are you going to do with him?” The question came out before you could stop yourself. Bucky, of course, couldn’t answer in his wolf form, but he gave what answer he could by hanging his head low to the ground. Guilt? Remorse? Both? It was impossible to know exactly. The pain in your leg had receded somewhat, down to a pounding ache, but it was still hard to think around it.

“Did you know him?”

Bucky shook his furry head side to side. 

So a random, albeit violent, werewolf was roaming the woods, which meant there were likely others nearby too. Great.

“Can you get me back to the cabin? I can’t walk.”

In less than a second, Bucky shifted back to his human form, still on all fours. The light from the full moon didn’t lend much to your ability to see him, but you averted your eyes anyway since he was naked. Okay, maybe you did peek for a few seconds before you turned away. Hey, you’re only human.

“I’m gonna have to carry you, is that okay?” A reassuringly warm hand on your shoulder relaxed you slightly, and you wondered if he was always that warm, or if it was just a result of the shift or your exposure to the cold. Either way, you didn’t want to be out here a second longer than you had to, so you nodded.

A fresh wave of pain made you cry out again as Bucky slid his arms beneath your knees and behind your back and lifted you with ease. You felt the blood drain from your face and the world tilted a bit, so you leaned your head against Bucky’s bare chest for a little extra warmth. Each step he took jostled your legs - it couldn’t be helped - and he kept apologizing the whole way back up the trail. 

Back at the cabin, Bucky laid you gently down on the couch and excused himself so he could get dressed. You tried to sit up and look at the damage, but the motion made your head swim, either from shock or blood loss. You were almost too afraid to find out which. All you could muster was to lay back with your head resting against the arm of the couch and count the seconds until Bucky returned, each beat of your heart sending a new flame of pain up your leg. 

Twenty-eight seconds passed before Bucky’s heavy footsteps came back toward you. “Don’t worry,” he tried to assure you as he approached with a satchel over his shoulder. “I have a pretty heavy duty first aid kit here. Well, it’s more like a first responder’s kit. Don’t ask. Did you bring your phone with you? These days you might get a signal up here.”

Your  _ phone _ . You could have kicked yourself. It hadn’t even occurred to you to try to make a call. You patted your pockets, only to find them empty. “ _ Shit _ ,” you snapped, your stomach clenching so hard it felt like a rock. “It must have fallen out of my pocket when…” The rock turned to ice, and you had to swallow against the stab of nausea you felt. 

“It’s okay, I can patch you up and you can ride my back down the trail to your car, if you want. I can get you there faster than you walked up.” You could tell Bucky was trying to sound sure of himself, but your journalist instinct picked up on his fear. He knew the risk of going back out there. 

Bucky pulled out a big pair of scissors and began to cut off the part of your pants leg that covered the bite. In the light of the fire you could see the fabric had turned a dark crimson with your blood. You wondered briefly just how much blood you had to lose before it was dangerous, but you pushed the thought from your head before it made you panic. Now was not the time for hysterics.

You shook your head at his suggestion, watching as he tried his best to gently clean your leg. “There is no way I’m going back out there until the sun is up, and -  _ ow  _ \- I can’t drive with my leg like this. I’ll just have to -  _ ow _ ! - find my phone in the morning and hope the battery held out, since I -  _ fuck _ ! - charged it before the hike up here. You almost done down there?” Bucky was cleaning around the puncture wounds with gauze and rubbing alcohol, and every time he wiped away more dried blood it burned like hell. 

But as you watched him, for a moment you were able to see him, really see him, and it brought a little flutter to your chest to remember how handsome he had always been in school. How kind he was to everyone. A buried memory from years long past surfaced, of taking his picture for the school paper for winning a national merit scholarship. The way he made it so easy for you with his effortless good looks and unique smile. While reviewing the photos he had made a joke about you being the one he would call to take his picture if he ever won a Nobel prize.

A warm hand on your thigh brought you back to the present. Bucky was leaned over to his left, rummaging around inside his first aid satchel, his right hand holding him up using your leg. His fingers squeezed slightly when he produced the tape and gauze with a flourish and an  _ aha! _ In the midst of your pain and shock, you had to force down the out-of-place jolt of desire that took you by surprise. 

“The bleeding has stopped at least,” Bucky informed you, moving his hand away to measure out the size of gauze that he needed. Evidently he hadn’t noticed the placement of his hand, or your response to it. “Let’s get you bandaged up. I think it’s time I finished what I was going to say before.”

Heat returned to your cheeks, and you knew you likely turned a deep shade of red with embarrassment for running out on him earlier. 

“Glad to see some color in your face, you were pretty pale before. I was beginning to worry.” Bucky lightly placed the large piece of gauze over the bites on your leg and started to tear off pieces of gauze tape to hold it down. Once he was done inspecting his work he stood up and helped you sit upright. Luckily you didn’t feel dizzy anymore, and the pain wasn’t overwhelming. 

“First things first,” he began, settling into the same chair as before. “I’m a werewolf, if you hadn’t guessed already.”

There it was, the confirmation. The word sounded strange coming out of his mouth in such a serious context. But there was no time to process this revelation, so you just nodded.

“Now that that’s out of the way, there are a few things you should know. It’s near midnight, on All Hallow’s Eve. It’s also a full moon. That means a lot of weird, fucked up shit can happen tonight.” Bucky looked away, at the fire, a contemplative frown on his face. “Ten years ago I came up here late at night, on a full moon, pissed off at my parents after arguing with them. There was a wolf waiting for me here, right outside the cabin.”

You could tell where this story was going but you didn’t want to stop him. Clearly he needed to tell someone. It made you wonder - how long had it been since he’s had contact with another human being?

Bucky’s gaze went to the floor, eyes darkening with the memory. “He attacked me, left me for dead, and disappeared. I somehow dragged myself inside the cabin with bites all over my legs, fully expecting to bleed to death. But I didn’t.

I had washed the bites with cold water and paper towels but they wouldn’t stop bleeding. Eventually I passed out, I don’t remember how long it took. I woke up the next day around noon or so, weak and hungry and thirsty. There was blood all over the floor. I remember I hobbled into the kitchen and ate some soup right out of the can, and drank like a gallon of water. By that night no one had come up to find me.”

You couldn’t imagine how he must have felt all those years ago, frightened and seriously injured in the middle of nowhere. Just a kid, all on his own with no answers and no way to call for help. Back then cell phones were still highly unreliable except in cities, and wireless internet access wasn’t a thing. This cabin didn’t even have electricity, let alone a phone line.

Bucky sighed deeply at this point in his story. He pointedly stared at your leg, his lips shut tight. Shaking his head, he picked up where he left off, hands coming together in his lap. “Finally, the next day, my dad came up here looking for me. He brought me to the hospital and swore me to secrecy. He didn’t believe me and thought I had hurt myself with a screwdriver to spite him. So I dropped it. 

A few weeks later, we had another full moon. I fell asleep that night and woke up in the woods, as a wolf. I was scared, so I left the valley. Slept in cabins and abandoned buildings all over the state and ate rabbits and squirrels. Never let another human see me. I didn’t want to hurt anyone.”

A pang of sympathy made your heart squeeze as you pictured him as the nomad lone wolf. The loneliness he must have felt, the intense isolation he had sentenced himself to. He had given up everything. College, love, a family, a career. Wandering for the rest of his life. No companionship, no home, just the endless expanse of land between cities as a cushion of safety to protect everyone else. And he had broken his vow to save you.

A hot tear slid down your cheek and you tried to wipe it away before Bucky noticed. He saw you, though, and offered you a small smile. 

“Sorry, I know you don’t want my pity.” That would be the last thing you’d want, that much you knew. “Why did you come back?”

Bucky frowned again, then shrugged it away. His left hand fiddled with one of his shirt buttons as he thought. “I dunno, I just had a feeling I guess. Good thing I did, huh?”

_ Biggest understatement of the century. _ “Yeah.”

“There’s, uh -” Bucky cleared his throat awkwardly. He stood up and crossed the room to sit next to you on the couch. This had to be serious. “There’s something else you need to know.”

A quick rush of adrenaline made your heart beat even faster. What else could go wrong tonight? 

“Werewolves can only turn humans during a full moon, and they do it by biting. Not all of them want to, so some lock themselves up, but most don’t. There are some packs out there that look to recruit new members every full moon. And there are some that…” He swallowed hard, his eyes darting around the room. “Some are just cruel. It’s impossible to know the intentions of the one who attacked you tonight. So you might want to prepare yourself. It’s All Hallow’s Eve,  _ and  _ a full moon. That hasn’t happened in about 35 years. For all we know you could turn into some super werewolf next month.”

Your head swam and you had to steady yourself. You had  _ just  _ found out about this whole supernatural world, in what could be the worst way possible, and now you had to worry about joining them. An image flashed in your mind, of yourself running through the forest as a massive gray wolf like Bucky, chasing through the wind on a hunt. It felt like a fantasy, something you’d only wonder about. But fantasy was quickly blurring into reality. 

Bucky placed his hand on yours and squeezed it reassuringly. “I’m so sorry this happened to you. Even if you don’t turn, this will probably be the worst night of your life.”

You were touched by the genuine concern written on his face. He knew how it felt to be a new werewolf, scared and alone in a body that takes time to control, and to him it was clearly the worst thing in the world. His body had been violated, changed against his will. That kind of trauma lasts a lifetime. At the very least you were afforded a chance to get used to the idea before it would potentially happen. But that didn’t mean you had to like it. 

“ _ Fuck _ !” You swore, stomping your uninjured foot on the floor so hard it made one of the logs in the fire tilt over. “Why did I have to be so nosy? Why couldn’t I have been satisfied staying home and passing out candy tonight? I knew better than to climb the wolf-infested mountains no one visited anymore, but  _ nooooo _ , I had to be the one to prove everyone wrong! And it may have gotten my best friend in the entire world killed!”

Bucky stayed silent, watching you carefully while you sorted through your racing thoughts. A far-off yell brought them to a screeching halt, your hands turning to ice as you imagined who it could be. 

Bucky tilted his head toward the door. “What the hell was that?” 

You stood up slowly and limped the few steps it took to cross to the front window. Artificial light pierced through the fog some distance down the trail, and it appeared to be a group of people, approaching fast.  _ Heather must have made it down and come back with help _ , you assumed. “I’ll go check it out,” you told Bucky, but he shook his head at you. 

“What if it’s a pack in human form? I’ll come with you.” He shifted into a wolf and shook himself out of his clothes, padding across the room to stand at your side. You didn’t like it, but you didn’t think you could stop him.

Another indistinct yell, this time louder and more panicked, carried up to the cabin, and your stomach twisted into knots. 

_ The body! _

“This isn’t gonna be pretty,” you warned Bucky. “Stay back so they won’t hurt you.”

You cracked the front door open and slipped out onto the rickety porch, limping heavily on your left side. Heather’s voice, as well as the footsteps of dozens of people, cut through the misty haze. 

“I found her! She’s up here! Quick, she’s hurt!”

A flurry of activity surrounded you as you came down the few steps. The ache in your leg was becoming unbearable again, and Heather - now clad in weather appropriate boots, jeans, and a sweater - caught you before you fell in the dirt again. Close behind her was a mob of people you knew, from police and EMTs to hunters and regular civilians. Heather began to sob and she took your face in her hands to inspect you. 

“I thought you were dead! Don’t do that to me again, you hear me?” 

Fresh tears fell as you embraced your best friend, rejoicing in the solid feel of her warm body. You didn’t know how she had made it down the mountain to get help, and you would have to ask her later. You were just glad she was alive.

Police tried to bombard you with questions but Heather fended them off, insisting that they wait until you got some medical treatment. She clung to your hand as two EMTs examined your leg and declared you safe for transport, and she refused to leave your side once they got you loaded onto a gurney and strapped in. 

But as grateful as you were to be found, all you could think about was having to leave Bucky behind, after everything he had done for you. You’d have to take his secret to the grave. He had been right, there was no way anyone would believe you even if you wanted to tell them about him.

You spared a longing glance back to the cabin as the EMTs rolled the gurney away and your heart sank. Bucky, still in his wolf form, was standing out in the open, watching you with his intense steel blue eyes. Before you could stop yourself, a quiet “ _ no _ ” escaped your lips, and Heather turned to see where you were looking. Her piercing scream exposed everything.

Bucky didn’t even flinch. Five different police officers pulled out their handguns and fired almost simultaneously, every one of them true to their mark. Before you could blink, his limp body hit the ground with a huff, and his eyes closed. 

“ _ NO!! _ ”

Your shaking hands tried to unbuckle the straps holding you to the gurney but you couldn’t get them apart. Even if you had, there was nothing you could do to save him. The fur on his body began to dissipate, and the bone structure of a wolf transformed back to human before everyone’s eyes in just a few seconds.

Bucky was gone.

One of the police officers came away from the crowd, his gun trained on the body. All color drained from his face when he came close enough to see who it was. He lowered the gun and spoke quietly into the handset walkie talkie on his shoulder. A few curious members of the crowd stepped forward to see for themselves, and the officer pushed them back and assured them everything was under control. Three of them stayed behind to wait for backup to move the body, while the other two escorted everyone else back down the mountain, careful to avoid the body still left on the trail. Your gurney was driven backwards to minimize risk of you slipping out of it on the way. 

Just as the cabin disappeared into the mist, the mantel clock in the cabin - perhaps the only working piece of technology left inside it - chimed twelve times. 

You began to cry silently, not wanting any more attention than you already had. The world was going to receive a revelation it was wholly unprepared for, and you knew there was going to be an intense investigation into the deaths and your attack. And Bucky was gone for real now, just when you were getting to know him. Why didn’t he run? Why didn’t he try to get away? Why did he just stand there when he knew they would shoot him?

A quiet sob shook your body. Now you would never know.

Heather chastised the EMT for just letting you sit there and cry when obviously, she said, it was from pain and shock. She convinced them to stop for a couple of minutes to give you pain medicine. Normally you would turn it down but right then you needed to get out of your own head. A minute or so after they got the IV into your arm and gave you an injection of some kind of clear fluid, you drifted into darkness.

\-----------------------

28 DAYS LATER

_ “Some say it was all a hoax. Tune in tonight for the 11 o’clock news and see our exclusive interview with -” _

You clicked your TV off and threw the remote down, annoyed at the umpteenth so-called exposée of the murders on the mountain. No one had believed the werewolf story, even when dozens of witnesses told the same story, and it was written off as a freak gas leak from the cabin that made everyone hallucinate. It amazed you how stupid everyone was to believe that bullshit.

A shudder went through your body, reminding you of the time. It was less than a minute before full sunset and you felt like your skin was trying to crawl off of you. Over the past month, your leg had healed, but you had begun to notice changes like your increased tolerance to cold, and sharp sense of smell, and how every cat in the apartment building hated you all of a sudden. You weren’t stupid, you knew exactly what it meant.

Bucky had been on your mind every day during the last few weeks, and with the news constantly talking about him it was impossible to keep from missing him. You had blamed yourself for his death and were trying to find a way to forgive yourself, but nothing helped. Being fired from your job after missing too much work, and everyone accusing you of being a liar, was the tipping point. If you  _ did  _ turn into a werewolf this night, you were going to end it. It was hunting season, and it wasn’t difficult to find hunters in the area just looking to shoot something. You didn’t want to live the way Bucky had been forced to, in isolation and secrecy and in danger for the rest of your life. 

The alarm on your phone went off, and you dismissed it and locked yourself in your bedroom. You no longer cared about the potential pain or damage to your house, and you couldn’t look at the scraps of your old life for a second longer. Unsure whether the shift would happen on its own or not, and tired of sitting in the dark, you eventually fell asleep on top of your bed around 9:40 p.m. It was better than waiting in limbo.

In your dream, at first, there was nothing but darkness. A voice called out to you, indistinct but somehow familiar. A pair of blue eyes would flicker at the corner of your vision, only to vanish as soon as you turned toward them. Instinct screamed at you to move. Every step you took felt more and more awkward until you fell to your knees and began to walk on all fours. Your skin felt  _ wrong _ , itchy, like there were bugs scratching around beneath it. The darkness took shape as you ran on your hands and knees, your senses picking up trees, animals, bushes, the wind. Smells, so many smells, but they made your mouth water. Everything in razor sharp clarity, just on the edge of pain. 

You opened your eyes to find yourself standing in front of the Barnes cabin in late night darkness. It looked taller than before, so you drew your gaze down to your hands, which had turned to paws as white as snow. The white faded into a darker color on your legs, but it was difficult to see exactly what in the dark. A cold breeze shook the now-empty branches of the trees around you, carrying with it the scent of another wolf nearby. 

Automatically you bounded up the steps to the cabin and dashed into the open door to hide. Movement was so much easier with four legs to work with. Sniffing around with your new nose, you picked up a scent from a button down flannel shirt on the floor. Unable to express the wave of sadness that crashed over you, you let out a little whine. 

_ Bucky. _

The memory reminded you of why you had come here. You didn’t recall smelling any hunters nearby, but they were good at hiding their own scent so they could sneak up on their prey undetected. It was in the middle of the night anyway, and they’d likely still be sleeping. So you decided to wait there for a while, at least until dawn, when the hunters would climb into their deer blinds and shoot anything that moved. It took a little awkward maneuvering to figure out how to lay down with four legs, but you managed it, and you settled down on the flannel shirt. Before long you fell asleep.  _ Not much longer. _

You felt more than heard a presence in the cabin a couple of hours later. Your sensitive nose detected a scent that made you perk up immediately in surprise, ears twitching to try to pick up its origin. Desperately you paced back and forth, sniffing here and there, until finally you heard it. Footsteps, right outside. It seemed impossible, but these days it was impossible to know exactly what  _ was  _ impossible.

Your legs took you through the door and over the broken railing on the porch, and you skidded on the leaves a bit when you landed next to him. For the first time in a month, you smiled. He was so beautiful, his silver-gray fur shining in the full midnight moon, so majestic and proud and  _ alive _ . You’d know those blue eyes anywhere.

The mantel clock inside the cabin struck twelve times. 


End file.
